“You’re a size and a half smaller,” I reminded her.
“I could stuff the toes.”
I laughed. “You would. But no deal. They’re going back.”
She shielded the boxes with her body. “Shh! They’ll hear you!”
I rolled my eyes as I removed the Louboutins. Oddly, I felt a little sad to take them off and see them go. These shoes probably represented three months of my income, and my feet seemed to feel the loss. I placed them back in their bag and nestled them into the box once more. Then I checked the delivery carton. The return address was Golden Personal Shopping.
Of course. Reid Wolfe used a personal shopper. Not that I thought for a minute that he’d gone in search of women’s shoes. Still, though, to see the evidence of a personal shopper bummed me out a bit.
I wasn’t sure why.
“Sorry, Mo.” I handed her the Jimmy Choo box. “Back they go.”
“Goodbye, my pretties.” Mo removed the pumps and placed them back in their box. “You’re a meanie,” she said to me.
“If you want a box of shoes, you can snuggle up to Reid tonight at dinner. I’m sure he’ll be happy to oblige you.”
“Ha! He’s clearly already smitten with you, if this”—she gestured to what she called shoe porn—“is any indication.”
Smitten with me? I held back a slight smile at the thought. He wasn’t smitten. He only wanted something.
Which was why I hated the fact that a small part of me wanted Mo to be right.
10
Reid
A hundred million.
That was what Wolfe Enterprises would have to pay to get this contract back on track.
Some meeting.
I was pissed.
Really pissed.
Rock had already flown back to New York, and though he was the CEO, he had given me authority to do whatever was necessary to get things moving as we were already losing millions per day because of contractor issues.
I could sue.
Indeed, I wanted to sue, because this contractor had screwed up. Why should we pay the price? But as a businessman, I knew a lawsuit would ultimately cost us more money. Some system, huh?
My father taught me one thing very early in the game. When you had money, people would constantly try to take advantage of you. The trick was to pay them off if it would ultimately cost you more money in the long term. Then never do business with them again.
Las Vegas Ace Construction was now on my short list.
Wolfe Enterprises had a lot of business in Nevada, and after this current project was over? LVA would never get another penny of it.
Rock had been holding out. He’d been a loner too long. A rebel too long. He didn’t understand that sometimes, it made more sense to pay than to fight.
He wouldn’t be happy, but I had the authority, and in the end, Wolfe Enterprises would come out on top, and Las Vegas Ace would pay.
Yeah, the Wolfes had a lot of power.
I’d watched my old man destroy one business after the other once he’d gotten what he wanted out of them.
LVA was next on that list.
“Fuck it all,” Rock said, when I told him the news. The jet was an hour outside New York, and Rock and the others were in flight when I called.
“You gave me the power.”
“I did,” he admitted. “It’s a fucking shitload of cash, though, man.”
“Cash we can well afford, and LVA will get what’s coming to them.”
Silence for a few seconds, until, “I still can’t quite wrap my head around how much we’re all worth.”
“I get it. One day, you will, and you’ll see I made the right decision here. There are still some kinks to work out of the deal. I’ll be here for a few more days to make sure it all goes as planned.”
“Thanks, Reid. This should be your show. Don’t think I ever forget that.”
“I know.”
Our father’s snub still stuck in my gut, but he’d taught me another valuable lesson when I was starting out. Don’t ruminate on things you can’t change.
Good advice, coming from a psycho bastard.
“So Rock…”
“Yeah?”
“Nieves says she has information for us.”
He scoffed right into my ear through his phone. I could see his face in my mind, green eyes rolling and all.
“She says she found something at your place that she never told you about.”
“She’s lying.”
“Is she? Did you have anything that might indicate your relationship with Dad?”
“Are you kidding? I tried to never think about the asshole.”
“Think,” I said. “Did you notice anything missing from your place recently?”
“Nieves and I broke—” He stopped abruptly.
“What?” I demanded.
“She and I broke up a while back, but my gun—the same model that killed Dad—was stolen.”
Bingo. “You think Nieves might have taken it?”
“I’m trying to remember. We broke up, but she showed up from time to time. I didn’t think anything of it. We ran in the same circles.”
“Was she ever alone at your place?”